Who: Garry Trudeau, David Levinthal, David Stanford, and Owen Powell. Moderated by Roger Rosenblatt What: Politics and Current Events Lecture Series: War in Afghanistan and Iraq Where: The 92nd St. Y When: January 26, 2010 Thumbs: Up, but could have been Upper

to come out of Meet The Press this week has been author Jon Krakauer‘s assertion that General Stanley McChrystal, commander of the U.S. forces in Afghanistan, was implicated in the cover-up about the death of Pat Tillman, the football-star-turned-Army Ranger who was killed in Afghanistan in 2004, ostensibly in an enemy attack but later revealed to have been killed by friendly fire. The Tillman story is tragic enough without the added layer of deception: The Bush Administration knew he’d been killed by friendly fire, yet lionized him as a hero falling to the enemy in a PR blitz. The subsequent discovery of that cover-up was a terrible black eye for the last administration — and, it seems, continues to have echoes in this one.

video

Author Jon Krakauer has penned a new book about Tillman and was on Meet the Press over the weekend discussing it McChrystal’s role in the initial cover up. Krakauer says that McChrystal knew Tillman’s death was from friendly fire almost immediately and to claim that he didn’t is “preposterous” and “unbelievable.”